:rofl

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TFCC ripped me off on shipping & charged me scalper prices when I bought stuf from them in the one dreadful year I was a member. I'm glad I see the images early if it upsets them. I could've waited for the images though, I rarely get caught up in all the hype about a toy anyway.

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*ahem*  :wave

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Phrases like "ripped me off", "scalper prices" and "I'm glad ... it upsets them" indicate to me you're mind is long made up already and not open for other input.

 

Plus ....

International memberships, yep, not a good deal. International Hasbro offices should do something.

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I don't think International memberships are worth it, not much more to say about it.

[rant]

TFCC ripped me off on shipping & charged me scalper prices when I bought stuf from them in the one dreadful year I was a member. I'm glad I see the images early if it upsets them. I could've waited for the images though, I rarely get caught up in all the hype about a toy anyway.

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*ahem*  :wave

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Phrases like "ripped me off", "scalper prices" and "I'm glad ... it upsets them" indicate to me you're mind is long made up already and not open for other input.

 

Plus ....

International memberships, yep, not a good deal. International Hasbro offices should do something.

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I don't think International memberships are worth it, not much more to say about it.

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A very valid point, but I for one am interested in hearing about peoples experiences w/ the club. I hope they do it right and just focus on making cool exclusive toys and making the retail stuff available to members more cheaply. They should forget about the exclusive pics b/c frankly, that ain't never gonna work.

[rant]

TFCC ripped me off on shipping & charged me scalper prices when I bought stuff from them in the one dreadful year I was a member. I'm glad I see the images early if it upsets them. I could've waited for the images though, I rarely get caught up in all the hype about a toy anyway.

[/rant]

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*ahem*  :wave

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Phrases like "ripped me off", "scalper prices" and "I'm glad ... it upsets them" indicate to me you're mind is long made up already and not open for other input.

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:pfx

 

But still:

Plus ....

International memberships, yep, not a good deal. International Hasbro offices should do something.

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I don't think International memberships are worth it, not much more to say about it.

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I drop $200 to $500 a month on TF's online & I know people who spend alot more.

Not worth it for International Members or not worth it for The Club?

Hasbro does not run the club. Fun Publications does, after paying a hefty, hefty licensing fee to Hasbro. After paying this huge fee, FP needs to make money. $40/year($.77/week) is evidently too much for a large chunk of the fandom to pay. If that paltry amount is too much for the majority to pay, then FP has to target the higher end market that will pay more. It's just economics. It might leave many fans out of the club, but it's probably the only way for them to turn a profit.

 

It'd be great if the club could be cheaper, but it can't be with Hasbro's huge licensing fee.

 

(I don't know how true it is, but the only rumor of a figure I've heard is the fee is over $10,000/year)

 

they wouldn't have a problem coming up with the liscensing fee (even if it's 10k a year) if they'd... oh i don't know, make it worth the while.  as for how to do it, don't ask me, i'm not the one that came up with the tfcc.  i don't Starscream about them at all, if that what ppl wanna do with their $40 a year than more power to 'em, but somebody asked for opinions and i gave it to 'em.

 

Whatever a person's taste in color(no color will be loved by everyone), a limited run basic repaint likely costs at least double retail, so about $15, then $5 to ship it. That's $20 of the $40 already. Future remolds will eat up more money. Full color printing isn't cheap, so say about $2/newsletter and $1 to ship each, that's another $18. So it's up to $38 out of the $40 not including the classified ads(which some think are a detriment not benefit), plus the exclusive/early content, plus the website/forums, plus the club store(which will have exclusive merchandise), plus a $50 discount on a Primus/Iacon package for Botcon.

 

hmmmm, well some people like repaints, but i, for one, don't.  hell i wouldn't mind the repaints, maybe some of them are gonna be nice, maybe it's a mold i missed out on, but i am NOT paying $40 for a Powerglideing repaint, i don't care if i do have a year to come up with it.  as far as a newsletter, thats to be expected, but even if you factor in the $3 every other month, that still leaves you paying $22 for a BASIC REPAINT.  unless you wanna take out a $5 subscription fee for the so-called "exclusive" content, and access to the club store that sells Blot for RETAIL PRICE.  whatever exclusive Blot they have in the club store will be the repaints offered over the previous years.  as for the botcon stuff, well there's a reason i don't buy botcon Blot and theres a reason i've never gone to botcon, can't afford it and don't care much for repaints.

 

The club is easily providing $40 of content in value, it may not be content you want, but the value is there.

 

hmmmm once again i was never Starscreaming about them, only stating my opinion of them, which is that what they offer isn't worth $40 to me.  maybe later on down the road when they offer better Blot or more Blot than i'll consider it.  you act as if your taking this Blot too personal man.

 

As far as the club store having *gasp* retail prices.... not much FP can do about that when Hasbro charges them just as much as other stores. The club store probably even has a slimmer profit margin than Wal-mart, Target, etc. that order in bulk. HASBROTOYSHOP.com even sells their stuff at retail prices. It'd certainly be cool to get things at below retail, but that's just not possible. Hasbro won't discount to FP, they won't even discount to THEMSHEVLES and their own web store. I would guess Hasbro won't discount things becaue that'd upset the big retailers tremendously and that would kill Hasbro.

 

they don't offer discounted prices at their own toyshop because they'd be undercutting their own customers.  if you havn't noticed as well, they also wait until much after the retail date to offer stuff, for their customers (customers being target, walmart, ect...).  i don't think hasbro giving a small discount would be too out of order, do you know if they've ever asked hasbro to offer a discount, or hell, for all we know they do get a discount.  point being we don't know what the relationship between the club and hasbro is.  if a club has a store and claim to offer members disounts, the members should get said items below retail price.

 

The only thing I've ordered from the store is a case pack of LOC wave 1 & 2. It shipped very fast and I got it looooong before wave 2 was every found in stores. The price was also lower than retail by about $1 per figure. With shipping the total was less than I'd pay at retail with tax, not to mention gas money. So I saved a few bucks and got items that most wouldn't see for months... sounds worth a buck or two.

 

well... i'm happy for ya, seriously.  because i just looked over the store and more often then not your better off getting most of that Blot on ebay or a retail store, because most of it is energon stuff, and what isn't is available elsewhere at either comprable or lower prices.

 

FP certainly is trying to nickel and dime fans to pay for Hasbro TENS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS-ing them with the licensing fee.

 

tens of thousands?  i thought you just said 10k and then you said you realy didn't know for certain.  you dont' know what they got cooked up with hasbro.  also, again, the store is supposed to offer discounts to members, when they're realy just charging members retail.

 

I suspect if FP can't be profitable then Hasbro would be unlikely to sell the license to another company. And any other company would be more unlikely to want to buy the license.

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imho, i think they just don't have their Blot strait.  they need to completly regroup and figure something out that will draw more of a crowd, then they might actually profit a little more.  once again i obviously have no idea how they'd do it, i'm not in that business, but i'm sure somebody there is.

 

EDIT

 

also, i'd like to say, kudos to them for trying (it's more than i'd ever do), but neither they nor their members get pissed off when somebody says they feel like their getting the shaft.

i thank edge wise for doing that price breakdown but at the end of the day your left with 12 magazines with nothing special in it and a basic toy with an extra special paint job and when you just forked out $40 (more for me since i live in the UK) you cant help but fell i little ripped off and im the sort who goes for exclusives and rare items so its not like im agaist the ideas.

 

 

maybe they should down size the club.. no store (its a waste of money as is) and maybe 6 magazines a year with some extra content (comic?) and as for toys maybe 2 basics or 6 minicons (one free with each mag that way) as for the conventions well im never going to fly round the world to go for 3 days of the same sorta stuff i get here bar the box sets (that end up on ebay any ways)

maybe they should down size the club.. no store (its a waste of money as is) and maybe 6 magazines a year with some extra content (comic?) and as for toys maybe 2 basics or 6 minicons (one free with each mag that way) as for the conventions well im never going to fly round the world to go for 3 days of the same sorta stuff i get here bar the box sets (that end up on ebay any ways)

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That would be pretty shweet... but I need the store to purchase those damned Botcon sets... I'm not a travelling man, so conventions across the country are out of the question for me.

maybe they should down size the club.. no store (its a waste of money as is) and maybe 6 magazines a year with some extra content (comic?) and as for toys maybe 2 basics or 6 minicons (one free with each mag that way) as for the conventions well im never going to fly round the world to go for 3 days of the same sorta stuff i get here bar the box sets (that end up on ebay any ways)

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That would be pretty shweet... but I need the store to purchase those damned Botcon sets... I'm not a travelling man, so conventions across the country are out of the question for me.

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well they do just open the store for the convention stuff and selling subscriptions but to sell slighty out of date stuff at retail just seems pointless

I for one am interested in hearing about peoples experiences w/ the club.

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I was in it the first year.  They gave me pretty much everything they said.  I got magazines on time.  I got a free repaint.  and I would've gotten a discount on Botcon if I'd've gone.  If the forum had been running, I prolly wouldn't have visited it.  If the store had been up, I prolly would've kept using BBTS.

 

But when it came time to renew, I realized that the comic wasn't that good, the newsletter had very little news, and the combiner was going to be very dated by the time it was finished.

Okay, first they Starscream about TFCC not doing anything cool/worth it to join. Then get this... they start Starscreaming that the Classics line(AKA Transformers: STFU) preview images are for members only :roll (which will probably start a series of things to Starscream about that're members-only).

 

I for one fail to see the logic here. Granted, most of the images are public now, but the trend continued with Neo Bumblebee. So what gives? Is it just an excuse to Starscream about something? Prejudice aginst Hasbro?? Or did something crawl up their collective asses and die???

 

 

 

Discuss.

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ok, the cheapest route is $40 a year...

 

for that you get 12 issues of classified ads, 6 "newsletters", and a repainted toy... hmm oh yea you can also buy stuff from the store at *gasp* retail price. 

 

so.... if all that isn't worth joining, 6 jpgs certainly isn't worth it either.

 

it's all fine and dandy if you got 40 a month to blow and your into that kinda thing, but for me to pay $40 a month , it's gonna take alot more stuff.  i mean yay they're trying, give 'em a cookie, but it's just not worth it imo

 

p.s.  attempting to keep digital images of toys (esp highly anticipated toys) exclusive on the internet is just retarded imo.  i also see that this even has pointed out a security flaw and they've fixed it... they should be greatfull  :tflaugh

 

p.p.s. exclusivity blows

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Wait! $40 a month?!? :wtf Dude, it's $40 a year. For all that stuff you listed, it's not that bad. Especially when you consider that you'd end up paying the $40 extra to get the Convention exclusive set if you want it. It's the extra money to get the newsletter and such early that I would have a problem with. Of course, I can't quite Starscream, because I'm paying it. :P

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Reread his post. Bolded portion especially.

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Maybe you should too... (peels off the PWN, slaps it on his shirt)

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Pretty much my sentiments.